child at Christmas by a new discovery. So is everyone else.
We watch as the ROV moves across a mottled sand and gravel bottom. Then, suddenly, coming out of the dark gloom, we see a propeller. It is covered with encrustations of marine life, but the outline is clear: three blades, one buried in the sand, attached to a shaft that is braced by a strut that comes out of the hull. So far so good — it’s the right shape, has the right number of blades and is off-center, showing that it is one of two propellers that should be on either side of the rudder.
The ROV swings around, looking up at the hull that curves out from the keel. Then it turns, and we see the rudder, still attached to the sternpost. As John freezes the video frame, we study the ship’s plans and match the rudder — its shape, fastenings and size — to them. Just beyond the rudder, we spot the second propeller. As I watch the screen, I think of how fast those propellers were spinning in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912— faster than they ever had either before or after — on that heroic dash to aid Titanic. Carpathia’s engineers and captain pushed her so hard that the hull rattled and shook—“she was excited as we were,” said one engine-room hand.
The ROV climbs the stern, which has a very distinctive shape. There is no mistaking it, and the curving lines before us match what until now we had seen only on black-and-white photos taken in a bygone age. Moments like this remind all of us how privileged we are to relive history, as stories and faded photographs come to life. The ROV is on the deck now, and a pair of davits for a lifeboat comes into view. They are in the right place to help confirm that this is Carpathia, but even as I note that technical fact, my mind is back at Titanic, looking at her empty davits.
Our first disappointment comes when the ROV encounters a mass of wreckage where the superstructure once was. We were hoping the superstructure was not damaged, but it is gone. The ROV passes over an intact bronze porthole lying on the deck, its glass unbroken. After marine organisms consumed the wood that held this porthole in place, then it fell free to lie where we see it. We go back and forth as the robot traverses the deck, revealing fallen bulkheads and electrical wire, broken glass and ship’s hardware. Carpathia’s deckhouses and bridge have collapsed, and I think of those plaques and awards, now buried beneath tons of rusting steel.
The ROV moves off the deck and follows the hull, whose steel plates are torn and mangled, but it is hard to say if the damage came from the torpedoes that struck the ship or from the red-hot boilers exploding as the cold sea flooded them. Gradually, it becomes clear that we’re looking at damage from a torpedo that struck Carpathia on the starboard side. The ROV does not completely survey the port side, but another hole, perhaps from the first torpedo hit, shows up near the area of the vanished bridge. It’s a sad moment as we inspect these wounds of a long-ago war.
When the ROV’S lights pick out a row of portholes along the hull, I am struck again by a voice from the past, recalling Lawrence Beesley’s description of watching from one of Titanic’s lifeboats as the lights blazing from Carpathia’s portholes signaled that help had at last arrived. The ROV climbs back to the deck and passes the steam winches of Carpathia’s forward cargo cranes — there is no doubt now, as we look at their position next to the No. 1 cargo hold, that this is Carpathia. But forward of the hold, the bow is in bad shape, and it is clear that the liner’s final plunge was bow first — like Titanic’s. But instead of falling thousands of feet into the depths, Carpathia sank in water shallower than her own length: the 558-foot ship went down in 514 feet of water. Her bow hit the bottom — hard — before her stern left the surface. It is ironic to see that Carpathia, while not torn in two like Titanic, is in worse shape than the liner she had once rushed to help.
The videotape is nearing the end now, and as we gaze into the murk, John Davis points out the most interesting discovery of all. There, lying on the bottom near the hull, half buried in the sand, is the ship’s bell. It is a riveting sight. We strain our eyes to see if we can make out if the name is there, but marine growth has covered the bell’s surface. More details are filled in: Carpathia’s fallen stack lies off her starboard side, with the ship’s brass whistles lying flat in the sand nearby, and debris blown out of the hull by the blasts is scattered over the seabed. Later, a group of British technical divers descend to the wreck and find some of the ship’s dishes, which they say have the Cunard crest on them.
To confirm that this is Carpathia, I look for ten exact matches between the wreck and the ship’s plans. Not only is this ship the right size but her decks are laid out exactly like those on Carpathia’s plans. The position of the deck gear, the single stack, the twin screws at the stern, are also identical — and then there’s the torpedo damage and the fact that the ship sank bow first. The excitement of the discovery and confirmation that this other important part of Titanic’s story has come to light is on all our minds as the tape ends.
In the morning, we will announce the news of the discovery, and once again Carpathia’s name will flash through the airwaves and appear on the front page. My hope, as I look at the fleeting images from the bottom of the sea, is that people in the modern, fast-paced world we now live in will remember the tragedy that led to Carpathia’s fame and the special mettle of her officers and crew who, despite the dangers, acted in the best traditions of the sea. In the days that follow, we are not disappointed. Carpathia again dominates the world’s stage, if only briefly, as we prepare for more sea hunting.
CHAPTER SEVEN
CATHERINE THE GREAT’S LOST ART
OFF FINLAND: OCTOBER 4, 1771 Reynoud Lorentz and his ship Vrouw Maria were in serious trouble. The ship was stuck fast on a rock, and from where Lorentz stood near the stern, he could hear water pouring into the hold. Everywhere he looked, he saw more rocks surrounding the ship like giant teeth waiting to devour her. Vrouw Maria was already badly damaged, and the violent surf threatened to overwhelm the efforts of the crew, who strained at the pumps to try to keep the flooding down. Panicked, the men shouted up at Lorentz, demanding that he give the order to abandon ship. Better to save their own lives than the cargo, they argued. Lorentz did not want to leave his cargo behind, particularly not this cargo. The narrow stack of crates in the hold, loaded quietly on the dock in Amsterdam, was far too precious. But, in the end, he conceded that it was time to go.
The voyage that was now foundering along with Vrouw Maria had begun on August 12, 1771, as workers began to load her with cargo for St. Petersburg. On September 5, as a strong southwest wind filled the sails, Vrouw Maria raised anchor and headed out to sea, “in the name of God,” as Lorentz wrote in the logbook. Heavy winds and stormy weather battered the tiny ship as she made her way up the North Sea, passing Jutland in a driving rainstorm. Finally, on the morning of September 23, Vrouw Maria anchored off the Danish port of Elsinore, where all ships running through Danish waters had to stop and pay customs duty.
The records of the custom house list Vrouw Maria’s cargo as sugar, “Brazil wood,” cotton, cambric, calico, linen, zinc, cheese, paper, indigo, mercury, butter and other items — a nondescript array that would hopefully fetch a good price in the Russian winter capital. No mention was made of the ship’s “special cargo,” a shipment for the Russian Imperial Court. Its presence on Vrouw Maria may have been a secret, or, as Finnish historian Christian Ahlstro m has noted, because royal shipments were usually exempt from customs duties, it simply may have not been listed by the Danish authorities.
Heading up the Baltic towards the Gulf of Finland, Vrouw Maria sailed into a storm on the September 30. For the next three days, the ship beat through heavy seas and rain. Lorentz did not realize that Vrouw Maria, drifting in the storm, was off course. Then, on the evening of October 3, the ship hit a submerged rock. The collision brought Vrouw Maria to a sudden stop, and Lorentz wrote in the ship’s log that “at first we thought that we would sink when a high wave lifted us.” As she drifted along, the ship hit another rock: “We struck hard and lost our rudder and part of the stern.” Leaking badly, Vrouw Maria drifted off again, and the crew anchored her. Every man took a turn at the
